Olusola Teniola a computer engineer, is the Managing Director/CEO of Internet Solutions Nigeria, a pan-African information communication technology (ICT) firm. He also doubles as the President of the Association of Telecommunications Companies of Nigeria (ATCON). In this interview with Ibrahim Apekhade Yusuf he speaks on the resurgence of cyber crimes vis-à-vis prospects and challenges besetting the nation’s telecommunication industry. Excerpts:
s Nigeria seriously under any cybercrime threat and which sectors are prone to these threats?
All sectors that have adopted IT systems into their organisations and these same systems are connected to Internet in some way are at risk of attack, whether criminal or otherwise. In Nigeria right now, there is a growing usage of IT systems in the financial, telecommunications, FMCG and aviation sectors, though other sectors not mentioned are slowly adopting computers into the way their industries are operated, the lessons from recently purported attacks by the Lazarus Group must be fundamental to how IT systems are built and adopted across all sectors. The threat of cybercrime will only increase in Nigeria as the country becomes more IT connected to the World Wide Web (WWW).
Do you honestly consider these threats as clear and present dangers?
The recently reported experiences of large organisations that have had their IT systems compromised by Lazarus Group in 2014 and the breach in data that occurred, mostly personal and financial, poses some serious concerns for Nigeria and can be viewed as ‘clear and present dangers’ to Nigeria’s digital journey to ensuring e-Gov, e-Commerce, e-Banking etc are safe and secure. The most revealing lessons of wide publicised cybercrimes is that personal data belonging to the citizens of a sovereign country must be preferably held locally in the country of origin and we need to build data protection infrastructure in the way and manner personal data is securely handled in our IT systems.
As a critical stakeholder in the cyberspace, do you think the country is prepared for the present challenges and for the future?
The country is not prepared on the skills set front, on the capacity front and frankly we run a degree of danger of national security threats to systems that have been deployed by foreign oragnisations that may use the same systems to monitor and spy on us using the very systems sold to us by them.
Are these threats by hackers on our space unfounded or real?
Without a strong local content presence in the Nigerian ICT industry, it is a real threat that hackers that are more knowledgeable about how systems deployed in our banking, defense and commerce applications are able to launch cyberattacks fairly easily and remotely from other sovereign states without detection and to a degree our laws and court systems need to be more prepared to fight this in a manner that has not been witnessed before.
What are the legal framework and safety nets in place to help anyone mitigate losses against cybercrimes?
It is my strong opinion that evidence to date suggests that Nigeria hasn’t prosecuted perpetrators of this crime and thus the legal frameworks (if any are in place) have not been rigorously tested to suggest any precedence. We are at the moment relying on technical solutions in our attempt to prevent the occurrence of such crimes. This is laudable, however, loopholes, lapses and system failures do occur and are a reality in the World Wide Web and any network that is interconnected to exchange information.
As an association, what measures have you taken to protect the integrity of your infrastructure, especially working with clients across the sectors?
Most of our members adopt international standards when implementing complex networks and over the past four years the association has been advocating for member organisations and other important institutions to migrate their Internet Protocol systems from Version 4.0 to Version 6.0 (i.e. IPv6). This newer version provides a great deal more protection over the current Version in place (IPv4). Also the Cybercime Bill needs to be fully implemented to the letter by all stakeholders including government entities and the Association of Telecommunications Companies of Nigeria (ATCON) will continue to advocate that this is done in the proper manner.
What role can the government and its agencies play in all these?
The government needs to provide an enabling conducive environment for the training, awareness and promotion of cyber-related education, skills development and local content development across every aspect of society, in particular the infrastructure must be put in place to ensure that Nigeria’s data remains sovereign and is secured and protected from unauthorised access.
There is so much talk about the internet of things. What opportunities does this portend to Nigeria as a country if any?
Internet-of-Things (IoT) in Nigeria will more than likely trend behind the envisioned launches by two major operators in South Africa, who are planning IoT applications that addresses: Smart metering and Smart water. These are on the back of 4G (LTE) network roll-outs and the demand for Africa centric type Use Cases that addresses real-life African problems.
What can be done to bridge the existing digital divide in the country?
Investments that addresses fiber infrastructure roll-out across national, regional, and intra-country connectivity gaps. We need to build more tower infrastructure, more base stations, more spectrums (more bandwidth). This is just as there is an urgent need for more government incentives that addresses lack rural broadband penetration. There is need for more education in ICT, more local content development and more digital literacy across all demographics.
Most countries of the world invest heavily on ICT in different sectors of the economy. But the reverse is the case in Nigeria. Does it mean that the cost benefit analysis of ICT is not so positive as manifest in the lukewarm attitude by the authorities?
Until ICT is viewed as a critical sector in the development of our nation in this millennium, it is always going to be treated as a peripheral in the wider society. Our reliance on oil and gas as the sole foreign exchange earner is a major inhibitor in us changing our mindset. In other advanced societies, innovation, technology superiority and science are viewed as key essentials to the development of any countries, future existence – this begins right from the age of five years old.
Besides the government, is the organised private sector also investing enough towards their ICT infrastructure?
The private sector alone is the main contributor of investment in Nigeria. When it concerns ICT infrastructure the Federal Government of Nigeria lacks the will-power or the financial capacity to fund all ICT developments across all sectors. The private sector has invested more than USD$68bn in telecoms infrastructure alone in just over a decade. IT systems investments are also in the region of USD$50bn plus in the wider ICT space.
Nigeria has remained a dumping ground for all junk ICT software and electronics with rippled negative effect on the economy, environmental wellbeing. What can be done to curtail this menace?
The National Information Technology Development Agency (NITDA), Standards Organisation of Nigeria (SON), National Office for Technology Acquisition and Promotion (NOTAP) are the government agencies that are responsible for working with Customs and other organs of government to ensure that sub-standard products are not dumped into Nigeria. I believe that a lot more can be done by these agencies to prevent this practice from continuing.
There’s been a lot of advocacy as to why the telecoms sector should be listed on the Stock Exchange. What’s your take on this?
Capital funds required to grow the telecoms industry is a welcome source to the traditional manner of private equity and debt loans to fund the build out of telecommunication networks. Access to the NSE to fund further growth in this industry is encouraging and provides the Nigerian citizen a stake in the growth of this very dynamic industry. The NSE will also benefit from the diversity that these listings provide in terms of the potential increase in the daily volume of the transactions that this will bring.
How has your leadership impacted on the Association so far?
My leadership is one of service and to this, I set myself three top priorities to do within my first 100 days in office. They are collaborating more with all stakeholders in the industry and this has happened in the first 30 days; attended West Africa Telecom Awards in Accra and gave keynote speech – this is the first time that this has been done and the outcome is that under my leadership, ATCON will introduce industry awards in the near future to match that being performed on an annual basis in Ghana and also, we are revamping our web presence and portal, which effectively brings a total rebranding of our image. This brand identity is key to ATCON’s future in this digital age.
Beside ATCON, you are also managing a pan-African information communication technology firm, Internet Solutions, how do you combine these roles?
In fact, I’ve been fortunate to have a great team around me in both ATCON and Internet Solutions. They provide the necessary support for me to remain effective. With them, there’s no vacuum.
What has been the contributions of Internet Solutions to Nigerian telecommunications system?
Internet Solutions has been involved in providing communication services to a majority of well-known banks, government agencies and key security institutions.
A major challenge besetting the country today is insecurity. How do you think technology can be used to tackle this menace?
Big data is the key to solving security problems in the country. Information is the ingredient of intelligence agencies and systems (more automated) are the enabler, alongside reliable connectivity across the country that will transport information to the relevant users. All technology does is to provide an opportunity to change the way we do things and solve problems. When we embrace ‘Big Data’, we have an opportunity to address security issues in the country.
